Auto Accidents Newsletters

Automobile Insurer's Duty to Exercise Good Faith

Among its other duties, an automobile insurance company is required to act in good faith when dealing with an insurance claim. This duty to exercise good faith continues throughout the entire claim process. There is an implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing in every insurance contract.

Motor Vehicle Insurer's Right to Reimbursement of Indemnity Payments

The obligations of insurers to make payments under policies of motor vehicle insurance are based on the sometimes uncertain answers to questions about the extent of coverage and the liability of an insured to a party making a claim under the policy. An insurer may therefore face a difficult decision as to whether to make a payment in response to a third party's demand for such payment under a policy, risking the possibility that the payment is uncalled for in light of some limitation in the coverage, or to deny such a request and risk a claim that the insurer's failure to make the requested payment has made it liable to an insured for additional damages, such as the amount of a judgment in excess of the policy limits.

Personal Injury Automobile Accident Cases

If an insurance policy covers accidents of travel, it must be shown that a death or disability resulted from such a risk before benefits can be paid. A death caused by the collision of automobiles is clearly within the ordinary interpretation of accidental means. This result is not prevented by any negligence of the insured. Courts feel that clauses of this nature must be given a reasonable construction. If the insurance terms are not expressly limited, some courts will extend coverage to situations where the use of an automobile was not an important factor or where the particular loss was fairly removed from an event that involved the use of an automobile. Other decisions, however, are not as generous. Some courts will not trace back an injury to an automobile or extend benefits to a particular loss or expense.

Setoff Provisions in No-fault Insurance Policies

When an insured files a lawsuit against an insurance company, the insurance company can file a counter claim against the insured to reduce the amount of the insured's claim by an amount that the insurance company claims that the insured owes to it. The amount owed can be unpaid premiums or funds received by the insured from other sources that would exceed the amount of the insured's loss. This is called a setoff, an offset provision, or a benefit-set off provision. In the case of no-fault insurance, setoffs exist for a number of benefits that an insured could obtain due to an automobile accident.

Tort Liability of Owners/Operators of Commercial Motor Vehicles

The potential tort liability of owners and operators of commercial motor vehicles implicates a number of unique legal issues. These range from some that are more obvious, such as the simple increase in the kinds and extent of risks of personal injury and property damage that arise from commercial vehicle use in contrast to the operation of private vehicles, the numbers of operators and numbers and types of vehicles involved in commercial activities, and the so-called "deep pockets" of business entities that make them more susceptible to having tort actions brought against them, to less immediately apparent matters such as the existence, in some jurisdictions, of a legal presumption, which would have to be affirmatively overcome by the persuasive evidence of a commercial vehicle owner, that the operator of a commercial vehicle is in fact the employee or agent of the owner at the time the vehicle is involved in an incident giving rise to potential tort liability.